There's Pain Behind Every 'Okay'
by CaelusBlade
Summary: [AU] Nick has finally succumbed to depression. Can his friends save him before it's too late? My first fanfic. May be potentially triggering.


_This is my first attempt at a fanfic. The only reason I am even posting this, is that two friends of mine said that I should. I've never written anything like this before, so here's hoping that I've done okay. I will continue the story if anyone wishes me to do so._

**I do not own New Girl, or any of it's characters.**

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Slowly but surely, the darkness had made its return. It had been looming over his mind for several weeks, like a menacing storm cloud in the distance, slowly drifting towards him. The news had been all it had taken for the skies to burst open and unleash the storm; flooding his heart; drowning his soul.

Schmidt had been the one to break the news. He'd heard through a mutual friend that Caroline was pregnant. As if the news of her approaching wedding hadn't already been enough! As corny as it sounded, Nick had always hoped that it was he who would spend his life with her, even despite the way she had treated him.

Deep down, he knew that he shouldn't be so upset by all of it, and that the way that he was acting was completely irrational. He had been in love with her, though, and part of him still was. That's the thing about love; you never completely get over it. You can move on, but some dark part of you will always hold onto it.

What hurt more, though, was the fact that Caroline had moved on. After it had ended between she and Nick, she had gone off and built herself a new life. She now seemed to have everything together, or at least the beginnings of a life plan. Yet here he was. Nick Miller - the law-school dropout, low-wage bartender who shared an apartment with three other people. He hadn't done anything important with his life, and as a result, he was going nowhere. This realisation had eaten away at his already diminished self-confidence, and completely obliterated whatever self-worth he had left.

oOo

The others had noticed the change too late. At first, they had just passed the mood swings off as Nick being his regular, grumpy self. It wasn't uncommon for Nick to have constant outbursts of anger for days at a time. But when the days stretched into weeks, that's when they knew that something was wrong.

"He's gone to the dark place again!" Schmidt exclaimed to Jess and Winston, his face heavily lined with worry. Jess didn't quite know what to expect of the dark place, but the way that Schmidt had explained it, she knew it wasn't going to be pretty.

They tried their best to go about their lives as normal. Thankfully Nick was still going to work. He would leave for his shift without a word, and return afterwards in much the same way, quickly withdrawing to his room.

The roommates tried countless times to get Nick out of the house. First, they took him out to the bar on one of his nights off, but he ended up just sitting silently at one of the booths, with a drink on the table in front of him. Schmidt threw a roof-top party, inviting a host of Nick's friends in the hopes of getting him out and mingling, but Nick just locked himself in his room, refusing to come out. Winston even set Nick up on a date with a recently-single work colleague. Of course, Nick never turned up, leaving Jess to pick the poor girl up from the restaurant and drop her home. Nothing seemed to be working, and they had exhausted all of their ideas, so they just stopped trying, and put all of their hope in the thought that Nick would pull through in his own time.

Nick knew that his friends were trying their hardest. They were very visibly struggling, and he wasn't making it easy on them. He'd known that it would only be a matter of time before they inevitably gave up, but knowing that didn't making it hurt any less when they eventually did, even if part of him was secretly relieved that they had. They didn't know, but their futile attempts at cheering him up had been all that was keeping him together. It showed him that at least they still cared. But now that they had stopped, he began to question whether they truly did care. He was now falling swiftly down a deep, dark pit; the walls too steep for him to drag himself out. How could anyone have expected to help him, when he couldn't even save himself? Maybe he just wasn't meant to be saved.

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**_I would greatly appreciate any feedback that you may have. Please let me know if you would like for me to continue. c:_**


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